


trapped between two lungs

by demogorgns



Category: IT (2017)
Genre: (they're about sixteen so only slightly), Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - No Pennywise (IT), Angst with a Happy Ending, Asthma, Coming Out, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Song Lyrics, dare i say....projecting?, q-slur, why am i so obsessed with coming-out narratives?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-29 00:33:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15061163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demogorgns/pseuds/demogorgns
Summary: "Eddie Kaspbrak knew what it felt like to drown on dry land. It felt like hearing his own breath wheezing in his ears, like his own airways closing up and choking him, like scrabbling violently in his pocket until his fingers found the smooth round plastic of his inhaler. It felt like his heartbeat pounding deep and desperate in his ears, like black spots dancing in front of his eyes. It felt like relief blasting into his mouth, riding on a wave of foul-tasting air, pulled into his lungs with a deep sigh. That first gasp of breath as your head breaks the waves. Vision clearing, water blinked out of eyes to see the sun.That’s kind of what talking to Bill is like, Eddie thinks."





	trapped between two lungs

**Author's Note:**

> florence welch wrote 'between two lungs' specifically for eddie kaspbrak and the gays
> 
> here's the soppy-ass playlist for this if you fancy a listen: https://open.spotify.com/user/frankie.stein722/playlist/3BZHfFNDOKrvSRvJcT2ymY?si=0gmkdEVfTz-5w7mmDxWTkA

_Between two lungs, it was released_

_The breath that carried me_

_The sigh that blew me forward_

 Eddie Kaspbrak knew what it felt like to drown on dry land. It felt like hearing his own breath wheezing in his ears, like his own airways closing up and choking him, like scrabbling violently in his pocket until his fingers found the smooth round plastic of his inhaler. It felt like his heartbeat pounding deep and desperate in his ears, like black spots dancing in front of his eyes. It felt like relief blasting into his mouth, riding on a wave of foul-tasting air, pulled into his lungs with a deep sigh. That first gasp of breath as your head breaks the waves. Vision clearing, water blinked out of eyes to see the sun.

 _That’s kind of what talking to Bill is like,_ Eddie thinks. Like coming out of a bad asthma attack, taking that first deep gulp of air through newly-opened airways, the air so sweet all of a sudden because it feels like years since you tasted it.

They’re sitting on the trunk of a fallen tree in the Barrens. The day is warm, uncomfortably so, the sky cloudless and without a breath of wind, and the people of Derry swelter in their homes with their air-conditioning blasting away in vain. However, deep in the Barrens the harsh sunlight is filtered through a canopy of leaves; Bill and Eddie sit in a cool cathedral of undergrowth, listening to the soft music of water running over the stones and the sweet melodies of bird-song. The air is alive all around them. A shaft of sunlight pierces the canopy and shatters on the surface of the swiftly-running water where it ripples over the rocks, and sends rainbows over the two boys sitting side by side on the trunk that bridges the shallow stream.

They are both quiet. Eddie studies his shoelaces, the water running fast and clear under his dangling feet, the trailing moss carpeting the sides of the trunk, anything to avoid looking at the tall boy sitting on his right. He tries to keep his breath even, waiting for the tell-tale hitch, the faint wheeze and the tightening in his throat, but so far he is safe. Bill waits for him, patient and understanding, but Eddie cannot look him in the eye. His heartbeat matches the continuous breakneck racing of the river.

This will be hard. This will be the hardest thing he’s ever had to do. But it has to be Bill first, no other. Once Bill knows, it will all spill out of him, his breath will come easy at last and he’ll be able to tell the others with no trouble. Perhaps, with all of them behind him, he’ll even be able to do the impossible and face his mother. He just has to get it out here, now, look Bill in his eyes and tell him, and everything after that will be as simple as breathing.  _Hardy-har._

“Eddie? Is eh-everything alright?”

When he called that morning and asked to meet him in the Barrens, Bill knew Eddie didn’t just want to mess about in the water or read comics and listen to music in peace, the usual activities of the Barrens. The tone of his voice was somehow changed, wavering with nervous determination. Just Bill, he asked for. No-one else. He needed to tell him something. Bill naturally assumed something serious, although with Eddie it was really quite hard to tell. He had a nervous habit of taking things far more seriously than they needed to be taken, which might have irritated someone else, but Bill didn’t mind at all. It wasn’t so hard to calm Eddie down when he got panicky; a hand on his shoulder, a few soothing words, talk a little sense to him, and he’d look up at Bill and nod and take deeper, steadier breaths, and smile that lovely smile. Besides, Eddie wasn’t always as scared as he seemed. All that worrying, the constant chattering about this or that ailment, the click of the inhaler being triggered, that wasn’t _really_ Eddie. Underneath all that was his true core; and that was made of steel. Bill knew the bravest of all his friends was Eddie, for sure; after all, how can you be brave unless you’re scared first?

Eddie feels the gentle hand pressed to his shoulder, squeezing lightly. The pressure makes him warm all over. He finally drags his eyes up to Bill’s. He’s smiling slightly, eyebrows drawn together with concern, body curved protectively towards Eddie. The worry he expresses causes Eddie’s heart to clench with guilt, but he feels so safe under Bill’s watchful gaze.

“You said you wanted to t-t-tell me something? Is it suh-something b-bad?”

“No, Bill, no….it’s okay really,” Eddie protests quickly. His nails dig into the soft wood and cool moss beneath his hands. “It’s just something dumb, it’s really nothing...” He’s trying to tell himself that more than he is Bill. A part of him wants to tell his friend to forget the whole thing, to suggest they go back into town and call the others up, go see a movie, banish all thoughts of private conversation with the explosions of some action movie or fantasy flick. The quiet of the Barrens presses in on him, the closeness of Bill, the pressure of the truth; horribly, the tell-tale tightness is starting in his throat.

‘ _Cause it was trapped, trapped between two lungs_

_It was trapped between two lungs_

“Are you s-sure?” Bill can see it’s really _not_ nothing. Eddie is pale and sweating, chest beginning to heave, fingernails digging painfully hard into the tree-trunk. He can sympathise. Sometimes it seems like Eddie, with his debilitating asthma, is the only person who can understand Bill’s struggle to speak. The two of them both splutter, red-faced, as other people look on in embarrassed pity, and its that connection that brought them together in the first place, in those long-ago, half-remembered days of kindergarten. “It doesn’t seem like n-nothing.”

 _He’s right, isn’t he, Eddie? It’s not nothing. This is_ important, _this is who you_ are _. You have to tell him. If you don’t now, you might never feel brave enough again. Just say it!_

“Yeah...actually, um...it isn’t nothing. It’s not bad, though!” Eddie adds quickly, glancing at Bill’s pale, worried face. As soon as he says it, he knows it’s true. He’s told himself for so long that it _is_ bad, that it feels bad to him, but it never has. Not truly. His mother’s warnings about _people like that, those filthy queers_ made Eddie feel scared, lost, confused; but the actual feelings he experienced...those never felt wrong. How could they? When he looked into Bill’s blue eyes and felt himself soaring, when the touch of his hand made his heartbeat race and his skin flush, when he couldn’t stop staring at the light playing in his red hair or the strip of skin exposed at his waist when he lifted his arms above his head...those feelings were the sweetest things Eddie Kaspbrak had ever felt. He _loved_ those feelings; he revelled in them.

The only negatives were the fears; of rejection, of his mother’s shriek of anger, of Richie’s jokes turning cruel, Stan and Bev and Ben and Mike coldly abandoning him or worse, actively turning on him. Of Bill’s expression no longer kind, admiring, or worrying, but changing to disgust. Those fears were children born of his mother’s narrow-minded world view, the iron bars of the cage she’d had him trapped in all his childhood, and now, as Eddie sat trying to control his panicked breathing, they were drowning in Bill’s blue eyes.

“G-go on. Tell me, Eds.” Eddie protested whenever Richie called him ‘Eds’; he told him hated it vehemently whenever he did it, which only made the little shit do it more. In Richie’s mouth it was demeaning and infantilising; in Bill’s, it was the most intimate nickname ever invented, it made Eddie feel so wanted and secure and _loved_ he could hardly breathe, but in the good way, the way they sang about in love songs.

He takes a deep, steadying breath, pushing it past the increasing tightness that spreads inexorably towards his lungs. He can do this. He keeps his eyes on the sparkling water below them, distracting himself with the flashing, fracturing light. The rush of blood in his ears pumping faster and faster, fuelled by increased adrenaline, is deafening.

“Well, um, for a long time I’ve...I’ve had this feeling. Uh, this feeling like I’m different from other guys. And I think...well, uh, actually I _know..._ that I don’t…that I’m not...” Oh _God,_ why is it so hard to find the words? Bill always knows just what to say; he can spin whole worlds out of nothing with just his voice or his pen, a few words _just so_ and a whole universe is born, like magic. Eddie swallows thickly. Christ, his chest is so tight now, and he can hear the wheezing in his breath, like an old vacuum cleaner. His fingers brush his inhaler in his pocket, just for reassurance.

“It’s oh-okay, Eddie. Take your t-t-time.” _Take your time._ How many times has Eddie said that to Bill as he tried to force an unwilling word or phrase off of his stumbling, stuttering tongue and out of his mouth?

Bill hates to see Eddie struggle like this, like he does. He knows only too well the frustration of struggling for words, constantly grasping them and letting them slip through your fingers. He, too, can spot the signs of the oncoming asthma attack and wonders if he shouldn’t just tell Eddie to stop and make sure he uses his inhaler, and ride him home on Silver. Something in Eddie’s eyes, some determined glint, stops him though. A little, hopeful part of him thinks _hey! Maybe he’ll tell you he likes you, just as you like him. Maybe he really feels the same way._ Bill mentally shrugs it off, but the hopeful part remains, and he waits for Eddie’s next words with his heart in his throat.

Finally, Eddie finds his words. The simplest he can use.

“Bill, I’m gay.”

The words hang in the air. Eddie imagines that the stream stops chattering, the trees stop creaking, the birds stop singing and the whole world holds its breath, but of course that’s stupid. Eddie himself holds his breath though. He can hardly look at Bill, for fear that disgusted expression Eddie’s imagined all too often will be etched on his beautiful face. Tears prick into the corners of his eyes, fill up, spill over and run tickling down his face and drop off his chin and onto his bare legs. His chest feels like it has a ten-tonne weight sitting on it, but his hand doesn’t go to his inhaler this time.

“Eds, l-l-look at me.”

Eddie raises his eyes, breath rasping and rattling. Bill’s face is not disgusted. His perfect mouth is a little open, his eyes wide. Like Eddie’s, he is shocked to see, they are filled with tears.

Eddie opens his mouth to say something, something like _I’m sorry Bill, oh God I’m sorry, I know you think it’s gross but I just think it’s_ wonderful, _I think_  you're _wonderful, and I can’t help it God knows I’ve tried but I can’t and I don’t think I want to anym-_

Bill kisses him.

_Between two lungs it was released_

_The breath that passed from you to me_

_That flew between us as we slept_

_That slipped from your mouth into mine, it crept_

He can’t help it. Eddie’s chest heaving, his breath whistling dangerously, tears leaving glistening trails down his cheeks, his dark eyes huge and wet and terrified – Bill just feels a surge of protective love, the urge to soothe Eddie’s fear, to kiss away all the sadness and the bitterness and panic. So (never one to exercise much control over his urges), he does.

Eddie gasps a little into Bill’s mouth, and he can taste the salty tears that slipped over his lips. Eddie doesn’t move, frozen with shock, so Bill pulls away sharply, worried that wasn’t the right move to make. Eddie stares at him, open mouthed, but he’s breathing easier.

“S-s-sorry...”

“No, I -” Again, Eddie struggles to find his words, and then realises he needs none. All explanations are superfluous now, so he simply shuffles closer to Bill and leans forward, and Bill smiles warmly and does the same, and they meet in the middle. This kiss lasts longer, is deeper. Bill digs his fingers into Eddie’s thick, glossy dark hair, thumbs brushing his damp, fever-hot cheeks. Eddie dissolves under his touch, his own hands clinging helplessly to Bill’s shirt.

“God, your lips are so soft,” Bill murmurs as they briefly fall apart to gasp for breath, and then fall back together again. Is it possible for your heart to beat so fast it starts to beat slow again? Eddie thinks it must be. Bill wraps an arm around his waist to pull him into his arms, and there they sit, balanced on the thick tree trunk with their skinny teenage limbs wrapped around each other. Bill presses his lips to Eddie’s forehead and feels their hearts fall into a matching steady rhythm. Their breathing is both slow, even, easy.

_Gone are the days of begging, the days of theft_

_No more gasping for a breath_

_The air has filled me head to toe_

_And I can see the ground far below_


End file.
